VM RAM increase causes crash on boot (including host)

[John Kelly_3]

I tried to increase the allocated RAM from 8G to 16G on a VM and on rebooting it, it hung during the boot process (after 'checking root filesystem'). Any attempts to stop it were ignored. This caused the host to slow down to the stage where I had to RS it. The VM started successfully when I reduced the maximum RAM to 12G.
There is RAM and swap available. (I can start another couple of 8G VMs.) HPVM version is 3.5. Host OS is 11.23. Guest OS is 11.23.
VM memory config is now

[Memory Details]
Total Reserved
Memory Memory
======= ========
12 GB 64 MB

[Dynamic Memory Information]
Minimum Target Maximum
Memory Memory Memory
=========== =========== ===========
512 MB 12282 MB 12282 MB


Any suggestions about how to diagnose this issue?

[Dennis Handly]

How much memory on the host?

[John Kelly_3]

64G RAM with 96G swap

[Steven E. Protter]

Shalom,

Ideas always come to mind.

1) The memory is allocated to other hosts and not enough is left for this change.

2) A software bug has been triggered in the VM software. Check for patches or in this case a follow on version.

SEP

[John Kelly_3]

I already said that there was RAM available. I can start another 2 8G VMs with no problems. However it seems to be a problem when I extend this one to 16G. As an interim measure I increased it to 12G which worked fine.
I'll look for patches. Thanks for all your responses.

[Hasan Atasoy]

hi,


dou you have enough swap space in the host ?

HAsan.

[Anonymous · Accepted solution]

It seems you don't have mandatory patches installled -
* PHSS_37312 - HPVM core (now PHSS_38297)
* PHSS_37306 - HPVM agent (now PHSS_38298)

The core patch fixes the following defect:
11: Defect QXCR1000750762 QAR0003338
Using dynamic memory to deflate guests with 16 Gigabytes or more memory may cause the VM host to hang. A dump of the system will show one or more hpvmapp threads stuck in the following loop: ....

Make sure to have patches installed. If it still shows the problem afterward contact HP support.

[John Kelly_3]

That looks like the issue Stan. Thanks. I'll get some downtime to apply the patches and close the thread once the fix is confirmed.